Yeah, so the Broncos blew it over the weekend, bit the Big One, died in the dirt, they're not going to the Big Dance in Detroit. And honestly, for as much as I love them, I'm glad they don't get to go. They don't deserve it, they didn't want it badly enough.
The real story here is the Steelers. First team to be 6th seed and go all the way, Coach Cowher most deserving after 14 yrs. as head coach and permanent fixture in Pittsburgh, and of course let's all get on The Bus and herald his story; from fateful fumble to now perhaps his last game at the Big Bowl.
I've been a Steelers fan since I was 7 yrs. old, living in Columbus, Ohio, so don't give me any "fair weather fan" BS. The Browns and the Bengals were never anything to root for in those days, and being a girl and not knowing much about football, but having to watch it and nothing else in a house filled with men, I picked the Steelers because I liked the colors on their uniform. Who knew then I would come to love them more than anything, as I grew into the consumate tomboy, playing tackle football with all the boys in the neighborhood, running faster than any of them, and I could catch too! It was the ultimate club and I the only female; I was in heaven!
Then came the 70's and the era of the Steel Curtain. I idolized Mean Joe, Franco, and most of all Terry. Twelve became my favorite number and remains so to this day. During junior high, our phys. ed teacher wouldn't let the girls play football, albeit only flag, so I petitioned the school to try to change the rule (I lost), but in protest I refused to play the assigned girl's game of badminton and sat on the sidelines glaring at the boys and my phys. ed teacher (whom I also secretly had a crush on).
Throughout the 80's and 90's I watched Monday Night Football religiously, whether I was with a guy or not, much to the bewilderment of most of my girlfriends, who just don't "get" football. And if you don't get it, there's just no explaining it. For me, it's a lifelong desire to do something I know I'll never get to experience. At 5'3" and a little over 110 lbs., I still almost tried out for the women's version of the NFL but was talked out of it as I had just had a baby. I can't put it into words; there's just something about the team comaraderie that I never got to take to the next level when the boys started excluding me "because you're a girl and my mom says I can't tackle you anymore" (at which point I would usually knock them in the dirt just to show them that I could still tackle THEM). It's also the grace and beauty of huge men moving in synch to a little ball, an unlikely ballet that's both comical and exciting to watch. Then there's the play calling and the oh-so-complex strategy of the game itself, each coach on their own respective sideline, pacing up and down and reading their play book as if it were a mini-war that must be won at all costs, as if lives are on the line. And what I wouldn't give to know, just once, what it feels like to legally hit someone that hard and then get up and stand over them and growl and snarl and pump my arms together while other men come up and spank my butt. Last but not least, some of these men are just plain hot ladies! What's not to love? Grown men running up and down a field, mashing each other's brains out while wearing skin tight tights; the ultimate absurd version of a power trip.
So there I'll be, on Super Bowl Sunday, with around a billion or so of the rest of you, soaking up the ultimate of all power trips and hopefully watching my Steelers of days long gone by beat those albatrosses by the sea. I got my ticket to the Dance; how about you?
